


You’ve got mail!

by WendigoPatronus



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: F/F, Fluff, How to Insult Someone in Flower Language, sibling dynamics
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-20
Updated: 2020-09-20
Packaged: 2021-03-08 02:01:04
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,031
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26557783
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/WendigoPatronus/pseuds/WendigoPatronus
Summary: After the battle of the Department of Mysteries, Bellatrix receives a bouquet, but she can’t seem to be sure what it means...
Relationships: Hermione Granger/Bellatrix Black Lestrange
Comments: 7
Kudos: 121





	You’ve got mail!

**Author's Note:**

> Written in one night on my cellphone, definitely not betaed, might not be the best thing I’ve ever written but I really hope you enjoy!

« Bella, you’ve got mail! »

Bellatrix barely looked up from the crosswords she was doing before answering. She really didn’t see why her sister felt the need to yell obvious facts across the Manor. She sometimes supposed that if she didn’t do it every so often, her lips might stop working.

« Well just bring it here then, there’s no use in yelling! » Bellatrix yelled in return. The irony was completely lost on her.

She heard the footsteps coming up the secret staircase leading to her favourite living room in the East Wing just as she wrote « Agamemnon » as seven across.

« Bella, you’ve got mail. » Narcissa insisted.

« I heard that darling now why don’t you put it down, I’ll look at it later. » Bellatrix feigned disinterest, even though she was rather curious. Nobody had written her in fifteen years at Azkaban and then suddenly mail? It was sure to be interesting.

« Bella, you’ve got a bouquet. »

« I’ve got a what now? » Bellatrix looked up, expecting to see her sister but instead gazing at an enormous pile of red and yellow roses. That certainly wasn’t something she expected.

« Yes, and this little card that came with it: all my deepest condolences for your cousin, love and kisses, H. » Narcissa could barely maintain a smirk; she did love a good bit of gossip after all.

« Love and kisses? Who would send me love and kisses? » 

« I don’t know darling, the only people who know you are here share a very special tatoo on their forearm and none of them have a name that begins with H. Now you tell me who you are dating or I will tell your Dark Lord that you have compromised the security of my home. You know I can’t raise Draco in a house where I know he won’t be safe, don’t you? » 

« I’m not dating anyone, I don’t even touch Rodolphus and he’s my husband! Where would you even get such an idea? »

Narcissa looked at her sister as if she was particularly daft, which she sometimes tended to be. « Roses, really? And red ones at that! If that’s not a symbol of love, I don’t know what it could be! »

« The blood of Christ, for one, and the house of Lancaster, for two. Don’t you ever read books? Now just put them down and let me finish my crosswords, this must have been sent by mistake. » Bellatrix really just wanted an excuse to examine these with a proper florigraphy dictionnary without her nosy sister gossiping about.

« It must be such a coincidence then that the card was addressed to Bellatrix Black L., Malfoy Manor, East Wing, Secret living room, in front of the Daily Prophet’s Sunday crosswords.» 

« You are oh so kidding me » Bellatrix rolled her eyes in mock exasperation.

« I am not! » Narcissa tried to look offended, but she ended up looking triumphant as she handed the card to her dark-haired sister. « And what do you make of the yellow roses? Is that not undying love if I remember correctly? »

« You most certainly do not » grumbled Bellatrix, knowing for a fact that she did, « it means extreme treason and a broken heart. »

« So you are saying that some stranger took all the time and effort of mailing an owl that could go through the Manor’s protections to mail you flowers about Christ and a broken heart? » Narcissa raised a blond, finely puckered eyebrow at a precisely calculated height to convey her disbelief.

« Well it might be telling me I’m a blood traitor. That would go quite well with the letter about our cousin, seeing as I’ve kind of killed him after all. It would make a lot more sense for Hermione to send me that than for her to tell me something about undying and eternal love... »

« Wait, Hermione? Isn’t that a kid in Draco’s class? » 

« Yeah, but she’s also the brightest witch of her age, a damned good spellcaster and she has that odd dark sense of humour... »

« You seem to know her quite well little sister, no wonder you’re so sure it’s her that sent you flowers! Oh would you look at that you’re blushing! »

« I am not! » said Bellatrix, her cheeks as red as her cherry lipstick.

« I hadn’t seen that look on your face since you snogged that Ravenclaw in the Quidditch changing rooms in sixth grade! What happened? »

« Nothing » said Bellatrix, lying.

« Liar » retorted Narcissa, truthfully

« Am not! »

« You are. »

Bellatrix made sure everyone in the room knew she was the oldest and the most mature by sticking out her tongue at her younger sister.

« So, what are you going to send her back? »

« I don’t have to send anything to anyone Cissy! »

« Well you can’t just receive such a message and not respond to it! »

« What, being called a blood traitor or being told that you are a sixteen-year-old’s true love? » Bellatrix quipped.

« Both! » exclaimed Narcissa, completely seriously.

« Both? »

« Both. »

« Both _is_ good » said Bella thoughtfully after a while. « I’m going to send her some sticky catchflies! »

The blonde Black sister rummaged through her memory trying to remember the meaning behind such a specific flower. « Invitation to dance? I get that it covers the whole love part, but how does it answer the insult? »

« Well when we were fighting last month, I might have happened to cast spells in time to a samba rythm that I was singing. It’s just that I happened to know that she took classes at one point and I wanted to give her a fighting chance, you know? »

« You are so in love with this one, aren’t you? »

« Even if I was, which i didn’t say is true, she doesn’t even know me and clearly only sees me as a caricatural mad cackling villain! »

« Bella, I love you, but you can really be daft sometimes. She did send you _flowers_ didn’t she? She could have sent you a curse, or a bomb, or both, but she chose roses. Now stop moping and start writing. » said Narcissa with all of her motherly authority.

« Writing? What in the world would I be writing? » asked Bellatrix, genuinly confised.

« The ambiguous love letters to go with the flowers of course! »

**Author's Note:**

> I must go to sleep now, so the story will stop here, but please tell me what you thought of it in the comments! Also, thanks to all the wonderful authors on here who inspired me to do a « language of flowers » piece.


End file.
